Notes On Operating The Flame Boss 500
A few things we'll point out about using the Flame Boss 500 controller:
- A frequently asked question about temperature controllers is whether or not you should leave the adapter installed all the time and if so,
how do you control air flow when you aren't using the unit. You probably don't want to leave the blower or the adapter installed all the time.
Installing it on your cooker is relatively simple, as is removing it. So, no. Don't leave your blower or adapter installed all the time.
- Placement of the pit probe can be important. There are two schools of thought. One is that you want it located near the meat so that the controller is
controlling the temperature at the location of the meat, not somewhere else. However, the probe must not touch the meat and should be at least an inch or
two from the meat. If the meat influences the temperature of the probe (especially when the meat is first placed in the cooker and is cold), obviously
the controller will be sensing a false low pit temperature and will therefore compensate by overstoking the fire. The other school of
thought is that if you are used to cooking by dome temperature (meaning as measured by the thermometer sticking through your dome), then you may wish to
place the pit probe on the stem of your thermometer to control the temperature measured at that location.
- And yet another question often asked about operating these types of controllers is how to use them to start up your fire. You will hear a lot of
people say that they like to get the cooker close to their target temperature and then turn on the controller. This is because they believe this will
help reduce the magnitude of any overshoot. However, most of these controllers are perfectly capable of controlling your pit from the start and bringing
the pit temperature up to your target without too much overshoot. Any normal amount of overshoot that we have ever seen has been too small to have any meaningful
effect on your cook.
In addition, controllers like the Flame Boss controllers have the ability to learn your cooker. Allowing the controller to bring the pit temperature up to
your target temperature allows it to start the learning process sooner and will result in better control.
- Alarms are communicated either via notifications or text messages, as well as on the display of the controller itself. However, alarm conditions do not show up
on the Flame Boss App screens.
- While your Flame Boss 500 controller is offline, it will still continue to control your cooker, using the
last known parameters. When the controller returns online, you will then be able to see it in the App or on the web page
and continue monitoring and controlling it from there. And of course, if your Flame Boss 500 controller is offline,
you can control it using the keypad and display on the controller itself.
- The Flame Boss 500 controller takes about 10 seconds to connect to your network and the Flame Boss Cloud.
Generally speaking, communications between the controller, the Flame Boss Cloud and either the web page or the App on your
smart device are quite timely.
- You can monitor a cook from the web page and a smart device at the same time.
- The Flame Boss App and MyFlameBoss.com can monitor multiple controllers at the same time.
Flame Boss 500 Open Lid Detect Results
How well does this controller handle opening the lid of your cooker? The Flame Boss 500, as we pointed out earlier, has a function
called Open Lid Detect. It turns off the blower when it detects the lid of your cooker has opened and resumes blower operation
when it senses the lid has been closed. (You can also specify the maximum length of time that the blower is disabled, the default
being 2 minutes.)
We stabilized our large BGE at 300°F, and recorded the results of opening the
lid for 60 seconds, with and without Open Lid Detect enabled. Here's how the two scenarios compared:
 Flame Boss 500 with OLD disabled |
|
 Flame Boss 500 with OLD enabled |
As you can see, the Flame Boss 500 performs admirably either with OLD enabled or disabled:
With OLD disabled, the cooker temperature
spiked 29°F above the pit set temperature. The time from when the lid was closed to when the pit temperature had returned to the
set temperature was 7 minutes and 15 seconds.
With OLD enabled, the cooker temperature spiked 31°F above the pit set temperature,
and the time from closing the lid to returning to the pit set temperature was 6 minues and 15 seconds.
So, it appears that the Flame Boss 500 can handle open lid scenarios quite well, with or without OLD enabled. These results are among
the best we have seen since we started testing the OLD performance of temperature controllers.
Flame Boss 500 Control Results
How well does the Flame Boss 500 actually control the temperature of your cooker?
Here are the results that we obtained when allowing the controller to control a large Big Green Egg at low, medium and
high temperatures, using the Flame Boss blower:
| Target |
Accuracy |
Swing |
|---|
| Low |
+0.6° F |
±2.3° F |
| Medium |
+0.2° F |
±2.3° F |
| High |
-0.1° F |
±2.3° F |
|
As you can see in the table above, the Flame Boss 500 performed extremely well. Compared to all the other
controllers we have tested, the Flame Boss 500 is one of the very best.
Summary
Here is a list of Pro's and Con's we experienced during our testing:
| Pros:
At the top of its class in temperature control, and far better than any indoor oven.
At the top of its class in Open Lid Detect performance.
Contains all the temperature control features that you would
expect in a top of the line controller: Open Lid Detect, Keep Warm,
Learning Your Cooker, Text/Notification alerts, up to 3 meat probes,
Amazon Alexa/Echo and Google Home enabled.
Display shows all four probe temperatures at once.
Blower has a wind shield.
Monitoring and control possible with App, website or the controller display and keypad.
Communications between the controller and the Cloud are very fast.
More accurate Platinum RTD probes.
Multiple ways to connect to your controller depending on whether you have internet access (Cloud Connect), network
access only (Local Connect), or no network access (Direct Connect).
Flame Boss devices have always been of high quality, backed by first class customer support.
|
Cons:
No access to History and Account functions if the
Flame Boss server is down or your controller is offline.
Cook raw data could be formatted in a more human-friendly way.
Blower has no damper.
Panel buttons can be a little confusing at first. Is the "Next" button
an Enter button or a Next button?
|
Flame Boss has provided, with the Flame Boss 500 temperature controller, a top of the line full functioned BBQ temperature controller. We experienced no significant
problems and were able to achieve precise temperature control right out of the box. If you are looking for a fully featured BBQ temperature controller, you can't do
better than the Flame Boss 500.
Availability
Flame Boss products are available from their web site, eBay and Amazon. You can click on the following links
to make a purchase through our website, in which case, we get a small fee.
Contact Information
Flame Boss
325 S McGee Avenue
Suite 102
Apopka, Florida 32703
800-978-9078
407-442-2771
Web: www.flameboss.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/flameboss/
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